Von Richthofen and Brown - Factual Errors

Factual Errors

The film contains so many factual errors (a selection of which are listed here) that it is effectively almost completely fictionalised:

• Richthofen is shown flying a Fokker D.VII before flying the Fokker Dr.I, when in fact the Dr.1 came out earlier than the D.VII. Von Richthofen died (just) before the D.VII entered service.
• Hermann Göring was not in the Flying Circus until he took over command some time after von Richthofen's death. Wilhelm Reinhard was Richthofen's immediate successor.
• Hawker died in November 1916, flying a D.H.2. Brown did not begin flying combat missions until March 1917, and in any case never belonged to the Royal Flying Corps (see next point). Thus the two never served in the same squadron, and probably never met.
• Brown's squadron had just ceased to be part of the Royal Naval Air Service, which had just amalgamated with the Royal Flying Corps to form the Royal Air Force in April 1918. He and his squadron mates would still have been wearing naval uniforms.
• Roy Brown and his squadron flew Sopwith Camels, not S.E.5s, as depicted in the film.
• Brown almost certainly did not actually shoot Richthofen down.
• Lothar von Richthofen did not join Jasta 11 until 1917.
• Anthony Fokker and Oswald Boelcke were both still in their twenties at the time - not balding men in their 40's. Boelcke never served in the Flying Circus, which was formed after his death, although he was Richthofen's commanding officer in another unit (Jasta 2) in 1916.
• Ernst Udet did not join the flying circus until 1918.
• The portrayal of the death of Werner Voss had little relationship with the facts. He was shot down and killed in northern Belgium, some time before Richthofen's death.
• Lt May did not enter the RAF 209 squadron until 1918 - in fact he was still an almost complete novice at the time of Richthofen's death.
• During a scene where the Red Baron is rescued in No Man's Land, the Germans are shown firing World War II era (Mk.IV) Lee Enfield Rifles. In any case, German fighter squadrons as a matter of policy flew well behind their own lines. The only time Richthofen was shot down before his death was on his own side of the lines. On the day of his death he was probably lost, and did not realise he was so close to the Allied lines.
• Attacks on the opposition's airfields (by both sides) were relatively routine and in no way "unexpected" - counter measures such as alarm bells, anti aircraft machine guns in permanent positions, fire fighting equipment, and above all military preparedness were also routine. Such attacks were normally undertaken by bombers rather than fighters, even by the Allies. German fighters, in particular, simply did not undertake bombing missions, nor were they employed on the Allied side of the lines.
• Base hospitals were not located at military airfields (this in itself would have been a breach of the Geneva Convention).